Hope for Denard's career rushing record

Before we knew what surprises Hoke, Borges, et al. had on Saturday, there was discussion (read: lamentation) of Denard's chances for the rushing record by quarterbacks. Now, with the 98 yards he could be as close as 207 to Pat White.

HOWEVA...in that discussion, people claimed variously that he had 4129 yards or 4175. The reason for this discrepancy was the 46 yards he accumulated last year in his matchup against Alex "Did You Know Graham Couch Is My Mom" Carder & WMU. Some sites count them, and some do not.

We UM fans have always decided to count them (witness the case for Fitz' thousand-yard season). As for the NCAA?

Yet another reason why Iowa has to somehow win Friday: gives him 3 games to get 69 ypg, as opposed to 104 ypg without the B1G championship.

BUT: the bulk of his carries on Saturday came from the running back position. Would the record book make such a distinction? The record IS "yards rushing by a quarterback"...but think of what wrinkles like the wildcat could do to record-keeping...

One would think that wouldn't matter, right? Except that keepers of record books, as we know, love to pick them some nits...

One of the reporters tweeted about this on Saturday. I believe it was kmeinke. The NCAA is going to count Denard's rushing yards if he is still listed as a qb on the roster, which is was last Saturday. Whether that remains, who knows, but I think the stats will count, the big factor is that it's only 2-3 more games

Question: Does it matter where the player is listed on the roster in regards to where he's lined up? Couldn't you theoretically list Denard as an OL and give him the career rushing record for an OL? lol

Agreed. Clearly, Denard is going to now go out there with his heart set on the rushing record. He's going to be an unstoppable beast doing all he can to rack up yards and move the team down the field. Therefore, he won't be focused at all on the team winning the game. The more yards Denard has, the less likely we are to win the game.

Iowa could win against Nebraska. Nebraska can sleepwalk in the first half of games. Burkhead still banged up, Martinez still inconsistent. A friday game throws everything off. Weisman seems healthy now. But god that defense is awful what am I saying...they probably won't win, but I guess you never know.

I still think Denard breaks the record if he stays healthy. Fitz now being out (get well soon man!) will give him more opportunities and I'm sure they'll add in more plays and schemes during bowl practices to make sure Denard makes history.

in the game against MSU last year? It seems a little ridiculous to think they would go back and check each play to see where he lined up and determine whether his stats for that play came as a "QB"

"He has no idea that Charles Woodson can jump fifteen feet in the air, come down acrobatically, and get his foot inside this football field. Folks, you can watch football a long, long time before you see another play like that."

One of the interesting stats that is part of all this would be the fact that Denard Robinson has averaged 90.9 yards rushing per game for his career at Michigan and an average of 116 rushing yards per game this year despite missing time due to injury. I find it remarkable really that, to get to the NCAA quarterback rushing record, it would still entail a slightly below average performance in the remaining games compared to this years numbers, and only a slightly above average performance based on his career averages. If anyone is interested, to cover the necessary 208 yards, if Denard kept the pace of his career average of 6.2 YPC, that would be 34 carries, or based on this year's average of 7.3 YPC, 29 carries. So, basically, an estimated 30 or so carries for some decent yardage would be potentially sufficient.

"Funny isn't it, how naughty dentists always make that one fatal mistake."